Manassas City police and Prince William County prosecutors want to take a photo of his erect penis, possibly forcing the teen to become erect by taking him to a hospital and giving him an injection, the teen’s lawyers said.

BY CHARLES D. WILSON

ASSOCIATED PRESS

INDIANAPOLIS -- Indiana won't recognize hundreds of same-sex marriages that were performed before a federal court halted a lower-court's decision to lift the state's gay marriage ban, the governor's office said Wednesday.

Gov. Mike Pence's decision, first announced in a memo from chief counsel Mark Ahearn, applies only to state agencies that report to his governor's office and would affect state services controlled by those agencies, such as food stamps or the ability to file jointly for state taxes.

Hundreds of couples were married from June 25, when a U.S. district court judge struck down the state's gay marriage ban, to June 27, when a federal appeals court stayed the decision.

Pence, a Republican, told reporters at a Statehouse event Wednesday that the state was only abiding by the decision of the federal appeals court that stayed the earlier ruling that struck down Indiana's gay marriage ban.

The Indiana attorney general's office, which is handling the court challenges, had no immediate comment.

New York – Today Adams County District Court Judge C. Scott Crabtree struck down Colorado’s ban on marriage for same-sex couples, becoming the latest of more than 20 federal and state judges to rule in favor of the freedom to marry in recent months. Judge Crabtree was appointed by Republican Governor Bill Owens in June 2001. The ruling was immediately stayed pending appeal.

Evan Wolfson, president of Freedom to Marry, released the following statement:

“Yet another court has concluded that there is no good reason for denying gay couples the freedom to marry, and has found marriage discrimination unconstitutional. It is time that Colorado’s gay couples and their loved ones be able to share in the joy and security that marriage brings, and time for the Supreme Court to bring the freedom to marry home nationwide. Every day of denial is a day of wrongful deprivation. Today’s latest victory in the Mountain West shows that all of America is ready for the freedom to marry ”

Same-sex couples can marry in 19 states and the District of Columbia, meaning that 44% of Americans now live in states where gay couples share in the freedom to marry. Recent polling by the Washington Post/ABC News shows 59% of Americans support the freedom to marry, while other polling shows that the support includes a majority of young evangelicals and Republicans under 45.

In total, 24 rulings in recent months have found that bans on marriage for same-sex couples are unconstitutional.

BY BRADY MCCOMBS

ASSOCIATED PRESS

SALT LAKE CITY -- Utah is going straight to the nation's highest court to challenge a federal appeals court's finding that gay couples have a constitutional right to marry, the state attorney general's office announced Wednesday.

The state opted to appeal the decision to the U.S. Supreme Court rather than request a review from the entire 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver. That option is now off the table, no matter what the high court decides.

Utah Attorney General Sean Reyes' office said in a statement the appeal will be filed in the coming weeks, to get "clarity and resolution" from the highest court. "Attorney General Reyes has a sworn duty to defend the laws of our state," the statement said.

The Supreme Court is under no obligation to hear the appeal of the June 25 ruling by a three-judge 10th Circuit panel, said William Eskridge, a Yale University law professor. There also is no deadline to make a decision, he said.

100 of South Florida’s Top Student Leaders to be Trained as Anti-Bullying Peace Ambassadors and Agents of Change at Leadership Conference

Hosted by NVEEE and Florida International University’s Honors College

(Miami, FL, July 8, 2014) – National Voices for Equality, Education and Enlightenment (NVEEE) will host its inaugural leadership conference for students ages 14-21 at Florida International University’s Honors College this summer from July 16-20th, 2014. One hundred scholarships were co-sponsored by FIU’s Center for Leadership and Service, Kaufman, Rossin & Co., Wells Fargo, and a grant provided by the Be a STAR anti-bullying campaign (founded by WWE and The Creative Coalition) to help not only students who have been bullied, but also students who want to learn leadership and social skills and become empowered to be “upstanders” as NVEEE Peace Ambassadors. “We’re extremely proud to support NVEEE and their efforts to make our community a more positive place to live” said Yaury Jattin of Kaufman, Rossin & Co.. “Their mission is one we truly believe in.” Other sponsors include BJ’s Wholesale, Publix, Whole Foods, and numerous non-profit partners who are staples in this community. The goal of the conference is to serve as a catalyst to support peer-led intervention to alter school cultures around bullying.

At the core of the conference is the The Peace Ambassadors program which teaches students how to serve as upstanders, advocates and leaders in their schools and communities in order to prevent bullying, suicide and violence. Students who are designated as Ambassadors at the conference will participate in monthly trainings where they will help create bullying prevention training materials as well as learn to co-facilitate NVEEE’s signature “Not On My Watch” Bullying & Harassment Prevention Program.

“Studies have shown that youth are more likely to listen and respond to other youth in educational interventions, setting the stage for them to serve as role models. Education is an essential component of how NVEEE engages families and communities in moving towards social change” said Jowharah Sanders, Founder of NVEEE. “Our surveys from 2013-2014 school-year found that 42% of students who were currently or had been previously bullied reported that no one stood up for them. So it wasn’t a shock when only 26% of students surveyed at the beginning of our workshops reported that they would help a student being bullied. However, we are proud to report that after participating in a series of our signature “Be Upstanding” workshops, that number increased to an impressive 96%. This is why our work in the community is important. Our goal is to turn bystanders into upstanders and create a ripple effect.”

The inaugural conference at FIU’s Honors College is designed to empower students like Verona Rose who was bullied and decided to turned her pain into purpose. As a Peace Ambassador for NVEEE, Verona has developed strong leadership skills and has shared her story during workshops of becoming an upstander vs. a bystander in the efforts to prevent bullying, suicide and violence in schools and communities. “Being an upstander is much more than a phrase or action, it’s a way of living. You should not live in fear of being who you are” said Gabriella Garza, a student who participated in NVEEE’s workshops and immediately signed up to attend the conference and become an official Peace Ambassador. “This conference will show you to love not only yourself but others. It will help you gain the confidence to not only stand up for yourself and what you believe, but to stand up for those who do not have a voice.”

BY MICHAEL PUTNEY

It was a moment of stark contrasts the other day at the Dade County Courthouse: gay vs. straight, well-to-do vs. working class, secular humanists vs. evangelicals, gay lovers vs. homophobes.

What brought them together physically and separated them philosophically was gay marriage. More than 200 people — hard-core supporters and opponents of gay marriage — tried to jam into historic old Courtroom 6-1, where Judge Sarah Zabel was to hold a hearing. So many spectators they had to open an adjacent courtroom outfitted with a large TV. It was there that the anti-gay-marriage group, wearing Respect My Vote signs, broke into Amazing Grace. They were answered by the pro-gay-marriage group, which began chanting, “Marriage equality, marriage equality.” Police moved in to defuse the demonstration, but the passions on this issue will not soon be quelled.

The tide is running fast in favor of same-sex marriage. It has been since the Supreme Court last year struck down key provisions of DOMA, the Defense of Marriage Act. The court said the federal government must recognize all legally performed marriages of same-sex couples. Since that ruling, some 23 courts have struck down state bans as unconstitutional.

The judges — of all political stripes and persuasions — have ruled the bans violate the Constitution’s equal-protection and due-process clauses. And those guarantees trump voter-approved bans.

In half a dozen states, the attorneys general chose not to defend the bans in court because they saw the handwriting on the wall (and the court orders) and concluded they’d lose. In Florida, Attorney General Pam Bondi sat on the sidelines for several months, but finally announced a few weeks before the Miami-Dade hearing that she would defend Florida’s ban. In her court filings, Bondi said that, “Disrupting Florida’s existing marriage laws would impose significant public harm.” She failed to say exactly what the harm would be because there would be none. Still, Bondi’s arguments got a big thumbs-up from groups such as the Christian Family Coalition of Miami, which praised Bondi for being “on the right side of history.”

But she’s not.

Bondi is defending the indefensible. Yes, Florida voters approved a constitutional amendment in 2008 that said marriage can only be between “one man and one woman.” As if multiple partners would somehow be involved.

But there’s been a seismic shift in public opinion on gay marriage since that constitutional amendment was approved.

I voted against it, but at the time thought that legal recognition of civil unions was adequate to protect the rights of gay and lesbian couples. I was wrong and in time came to see that banning same-sex marriage is profoundly unfair. Also un-American. If two people of the same sex love each other and choose to put their lives together as a married couple, why should the state prevent it? As Pope Francis said of homosexuals, “Who am I to judge?”

The judgmental should have a serious talk with the six same-sex couples who are the plaintiffs in the lawsuit before Judge Zabel. These are thoughtful, accomplished men and women who have made loving, lifetime commitments to each other and want their unions to be recognized by the state and to enjoy the benefits flowing from that. The plaintiffs were chosen well, the perfect poster couples for gay marriage. Most of have been together for many years; several are raising adopted children. As their attorneys noted in oral arguments, if the state recognizes their legal right and ability to adopt and raise children, then the state should also recognize their right to wed.

Judge Zabel should rule in their favor. Her questions in court indicated that she has read all the previous court decisions on this issue. I don’t see how she can allow Florida’s ban to stand. And if she does, then the Third District Court of Appeal will strike it down.

Perhaps that’s why the people who support the state’s same-sex marriage ban seem so desperate, so angry, so hurt. Listening and talking to them in the courthouse before the hearing and outside afterward, it’s clear that they see same-sex marriage as deeply offensive. Unnatural. Un-Godly. And an affront to their own marriages. It is their right, of course, to think so.

They also have a right to question why a judge can set aside a referendum approved by 62 percent of Floridians. But majority rule is not always constitutional rule. The question Florida voters were asked in 2008 simply violates some basic tenets of American life and jurisprudence: that all people must be treated equally under the law and receive due process. Gays and lesbians have been denied both in Florida when they tried to get married.

Judge Zabel can remedy that, and here’s hoping she will — and that the Third DCA upholds her along with the Florida Supreme Court.

The question truly is no longer about gay marriage. It’s about marriage equality.